E-Funds For Schools

This unique program has been designed specifically just for schools and can be implemented at virtually no cost to the school. It allows parents to pay the school by having their personal checking account or credit card electronically debited and thereby eliminating checks and cash they now send to the school.

Enhancement to School's Accounting Program

Service reduces school costs and saves money
Offers convenience and flexibility to parents
Provides comprehensive student payment tracking reports
Automated collection, tracking, and recording of funds for various school activities
Interfaces directly into your school's accounting system
Student activity and payment history reports
Cash flow projections and payment forecasting reports
Files and reports easily accessible via the Internet

Automatic Parental Payments

Parents sign a one time authorization form that authorizes the school to debit their checking account, Debit Card or credit card for school activities and lunch payments. The school can now set up automatic payments and the parents are no longer required to write checks.
Payments can be set for reoccurring amounts, one-time only amounts, or as declining balance amounts.

Payments through the School's Website

e~Funds for Schools can be interfaced into the school's Website by adding a simple hyperlink to their website which will transfer the parent to the e~Funds for Schools secure website. This means the school's website logo and wallpaper will be kept, providing the parent with the touch and feel that they are still on the school's website. The parent can make an on-demand payment via the Internet for all selected school activities.

Payments by Phone

Parents may use the e~Funds for Schools Interactive Voice Response system to make an on-demand payment. This is a quick, easy and convenient service that allows a parent to make a one time immediate payment to a specific school function such as lunch money or sports activity. There is a small additional service fee charged to the parent by the e~Funds for Schools program for using the immediate on-demand payment service.

Credit Card Payments

If the school wants to collect 100% of the payment due to the school, then a small "Convenience Fee" can be applied to each payment made by the parent to their credit card. The "Convenience Fee" is charge by the e~Funds for Schools service provider and is added to the amount of each payment by credit card. This additional charge must be disclosed and approved by the parent. No additional fees will be charged to the school.

Service Reduces School Costs and Saves Money

Your school can reduce, or even eliminate, cash or checks
Reduce the risk of losing cash or checks
Decrease the internal handling and processing of checks
Payments can be made by e~check or by credit card
Returned NSF (non sufficient funds) items are automatically represented for collection

A Convenience to Parents

Parents can choose auto pay or parent initiated payment plans
Parents eliminate giving their children cash or checks for payment(s) to the school
Parents can choose to pay from their checking account, Debit Card or they can select to pay by their credit card
Payments can be made 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
Parents can easily track payments to the school

How It Works

The school sends a letter and required enrollment forms to the parent to announce the new e~Funds for Schools program as shown on the following pages. The parent returns the authorization form with a "voided" check and/or their credit card information.

Individual levels of security are assigned to school employees to determine who can enter or access information. Authorized school personnel then enter account information via the Internet into the e~Funds for Schools database. Once entered, the e~Funds for Schools system will secure and encrypt account information so it cannot be recalled by anyone.

Payments can be set to withdraw funds from the parent's account automatically on a reoccurring basis each week (i.e. lunch) or as each individual payment that is due occurs (i.e. field trips).

The e~Funds for Schools system will send an email to a parent at their home or work email address the day before a payment is withdrawn from their checking account informing them of the student name, the purpose for the payment, and the amount.

Payments applied to a parent's credit card will have email notification sent the same day payment is sent to the credit card authorizer.

The school will have a complete set of accounting reports and files available to it 24 hours a day via the e~Funds for Schools Internet website. Payment reports are available to view real-time by the schools for a two year period. Reports can be printed or saved to the schools core processing system at anytime.

Special Features

The e~Funds for Schools system allows the school to deposit funds into multiple bank accounts in order to avoid co-mingling of funds. It even has the ability to issue a credit back to the parent in case of an overpayment, reimbursement, or cancellation of events.

There is no limit to the number of "associated school groups" or deposit accounts that the system can track. For example, this feature is very useful to keep the book store money separate from the school's lunch money program.

Payment Tracking by Class/Teacher/Event

The e~Funds for Schools system will track any classroom, teacher, or special event by assigning a specific ID # to each. School employees are required to have properly approved levels of security clearance, passwords, and user log on names to be authorized to accept and/or track payment information.

Quick Lookup of Student Payment History and Outstanding Payments

School employees with proper security clearance, passwords, and user log on names can quickly retrieve a list of payments that were processed through the e~Funds for Schools system. The student payment history report will also show payments that were due, such as a field trip or sports activity, but were never paid by the parent.

NSF Returned Checks Are Automatically Retried

The e~Funds for Schools system can automatically retry returned school payments using its check re-presentment feature. When a payment is returned to the school for non sufficient funds (NSF), the payment will be automatically resubmitted 3 banking business days later by the e~Funds for Schools system. This provides ample time for the parent's bank to inform them of the non posted returned item and also time if the school would like to contact the parent.

Recap e~Funds for Schools System

Associated groups throughout the school (i.e. athletic boosters, food services, and others) can use the e~Funds for Schools program for automatic payment collections and tracking.

e~Funds for Schools can be interfaced into the school's website to accept payments on-demand from parents.

Parents can make payments to the school by touch-tone phone
The school can accept payments by credit card from parents
The school can convert paper checks into electronic payments that can be immediately withdrawn from the parent's account

Is the e~Funds for Schools Service Safe?

Yes, the e~Funds for Schools system is monitored by the banking industry.

The e~Funds for Schools system must provide a secure encrypted payment website, the website is verified by an outside third party.

Multiple layers of security are used to gain access to the system; parent's banking information is encrypted, and never displayed to any school employee after the initial entry of the account information.